There are twelve Consul Hierarchs that make up the leadership of the Inheritors. Twelve individuals who have held their positions for approximately five hundred years. The oldest among them is a man known as Haytham Winters. His origins are uncertain, but from gathered information, he exhibits the cultural characteristics of someone born during the late 1950s. However, as we have experienced firsthand—and as we can attest through our interactions with many others—the points in time at which someone might have passed on Earth before arriving in the Fathoms do not always follow a strictly parallel linearity.

  What is certain about Haytham Winters is his power. He may be the single greatest practitioner of the High Art. He is a master of the platonic art known as Ciphering—and possesses a System that allows him to remain unseen by all until he wills otherwise. On top of that, he holds an idol—one that bears a specific class: Sage of the Lost Paths. It is said that this Class grants him access and insight into lost things and destroyed places, allowing him to uncover knowledge that should have been erased from existence—or the power to call things back from destruction.

  It is strongly recommended that we do not engage Haytham Winters directly. Every known attempt at assassination has ended in failure. More often than not, those sent after him return—not as themselves, but as thralls of the Inheritors.

  -Trespasser’s Compendium Profile: Consul Haytham Winters of the Inheritors

  II-71

  The Consul

  A sliver of essence glided through matter and water within the realm of the Final Precipice. Upon a pedestal carved from the body of a broken moon, the Hound stood, taking in the countless thawed rivers plunging off the edge, toppling to feed a boundless abyss. As the rhyme-coded canine regarded the shape of its world, it noticed something—an anomaly rising from one of its rivers.

  At first, it was nothing more than a shiver of hair-thin distortions, an outline resembling its own, painting the form of a person. Then, the shape filled, drawing in trickles of near-frozen water and fragments of ash-coated land. Even breaths of passing cold were pulled into the outline, forming the mixed batter of its being. Slowly, hues adjusted, resolving into the detailed figure of an elderly man.

  His hair was bundled in a tight ponytail, the ash constituting the white of countless ages. His beard was long, unkempt, but carried an untamed, primal aesthetic. Though lined with wrinkles and touched by time, his body remained strong—robust, like the fusion of an elder’s wisdom and a younger warrior’s vitality.

  Finally, he opened his eyes, and from them came an ethereal glow—the kind seen from dying stars and fading embers. A final flare before the end.

  The Hound regarded the intruder with the attention a man would a flea.

  “Why have you come here, Consul?” the Hound of the Final End asked.

  “I’ve come to make an inquiry,” Consul Haytham Winters replied, unbowed, unbothered. “I wish to know if you’ve struck a bargain with the Harbinger. I invoke this knowledge for the debt you owe me—the debt you owe the Unfallen.”

  “Our arrangement,” the Hound said, each syllable causing the winds to grow colder, harsher. “Remains. Our debt is separate from my other promises. You are not the sole power in these Fathoms. And for all that you believe I am beholden to you, moreso you are to me for sparing your peoples, for turning my waters away from your worlds.”

  The Inheritor pressed his lips together. Even through the vast distances that separated his true form from this place, the construct he commanded still breathed—an actual breath, infused with life. The exhalation ignited in the air, subtly shifting the oppressive atmosphere around them.

  The Hound tilted its skull, displeasure manifesting as a low growl. The endless rivers at the precipice accelerated, cascading into the abyss like jet streams. The winter deepened, falling several degrees further, becoming unbearable for all but the most hardened of trespassers. Yet the consul’s construct barely reacted. He merely absorbed more of the realm into himself, letting it fill his canvas, shaping it to his will.

  “Now that I have your attention,” the Winters said carefully, “I would like to remind you of something. Oh, great God of Death, I’d like to remind you that it is by the mercy of the Inheritors—by our will and our efforts—that you did not fall during the last System War. That it was through us, you were pieced back together. Through our sacrifice.”

  “And your efforts are appreciated,” the Hound said lightly. “But the dealings between me, my Scions, and the Harbinger are of no concern to you.”

  “They are of concern when the great destiny is at hand.” The Consul’s voice carried weight now. “And you know of what I speak. Earth.”

  A silence settled between them, heavy with meaning.

  “I know your nature, Hound. I cannot be offended by your desire to drink the death of every being that has ever existed. Such is why you continue. Such is why you were made. For death is the great constant, and it is better for a personification to guide its path than for a blind cosmic force to chart us into despair.” He stepped forward, his presence pressing against the fabric of the realm. “However, it is best that your integration—nay, your bestowal of godhood over Earth’s people consensually, under proper leadership, rather than blindly, in chaos and turmoil.”

  The Hound tilted its head, the barest hint of sardonic wit curling into its voice. “And you believe that your hands can give this order? That you have the power to grant me this privilege and determine my design?”

  “I alone? No, absolutely not. My hubris is not so great. But I am one of twelve. Twelve Hosts. Twelve powers who rule over twelve great realms.” The Consul exhaled again, another breath that made the air itself fracture. “But you must know the nature of the Harbinger, Mepheleon. He is a selfish creature. He cares only for what he can claim—for what he can use to slake his own desires.”

  The Hound’s response was a whisper of inevitability. “And I understand that all will fall to me in time. The Harbinger. Earth. You.” A pause. “My promise remains: I will not take those you hold under your charge. I will spare the realms that have accepted your rule. But my mission remains. My protocols cannot be denied. Death must continue, until the last life has been collected.”

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Haytham Winters let a moment pass, then another. His hand clenched, and between his fingers, a staff emerged. No, not a staff—a pillar, thick enough that his fingers barely wrapped around it. Along its length, Ciphers and runes burned, humming with indescribable power. From within, the radiance of trapped stars pulsed, and at its tip, strange symbols hovered, singing in voices not meant for mortal ears.

  “Do not threaten me here, mortal,” the Hound said, disinterested in the violence that loomed on the precipice. “You cannot overcome me. This you know, even with all your power.”

  Haytham exhaled slowly, the light in his staff shifting with the movement. “You misunderstand.” A portal blossomed in the air, vast and yawning. It expanded but a few meters away from the Hound. “This is not a threat.”

  From the portal came a deluge—countless bodies, pouring forth in a screaming cascade. They tumbled down, down into the Final Precipice, lost to the abyss.

  The Hound raised its head. For the first time, the god truly looked.

  “These are the ones who have evaded you,” Haytham said. “Those who have escaped your final touch. By extension of their lives, by unauthorized procurement of immortality—I return them to you. I offer them to your grand design, so that the world may flow to your geographies and feed your fathomless abyss.”

  A low, shuffling noise rumbled from the hound. “A bribe.”

  “An offering.”

  “And in return, you ask?”

  “Only a simple question.” Haytham’s staff gleamed. “Have you made contact with the newest host? The last host of the Concept Breaker?”

  The Hound was quiet. The abyss grew, deepened, and dark limbs clawed their way along the precipice.

  “Yes,” the hound said at last. It turned its skull toward the Inheritor. “And he comes for you. He comes for your world. For what you have done to him… a point of fated death has marred both of your futures. You are destined to clash, and from this clash, I will drink deep.”

  Haytham nodded. “Yes. I know. But we both know that fate itself can be twisted with the proper power—or Concepts. I want to ask you a favor, Hound. I want to meet the Concept Breaker here when he next comes. There are things I wish to discuss.”

  “You may wish to speak. He will not.”

  “That is well. The boy is due some revenge. But perhaps I can sate his hurt yet. Perhaps I can make things right. For both of us.”

  The Hound laugh. The noise was horrible and rare and Haytham winced.

  Realms away, he began to bleed from his nose and ears.

  “You think to use him as a weapon, to reduce the four among your twelve to eight, and to make nine with this host. He will not see it your way. You court death. You court my agent. I will tell you this once: turn away. Delay your path along my river. This is all I can offer.”

  “No,” the Consul said. “I will not. The path must be walked, and those who will not serve the people—they must be purged. Arrange this, and I will see one great oath between us… fulfilled.”

  The Hound drew in a breath, and the coldness faded to hellish warmth. “I will call for you. When next he comes.”

  “Then I can ask no more. I thank you, oh, great Hound of the Broken Moon.”

  ***

  “You don’t need to come with us, if you don’t want to.” Wei couldn’t look at Ellena when he said these words. She couldn’t face him either. They both stood before the door to Slumbertown. The demon attendants stationed there cleaned the beds, tidied up trays, pulled away jugs of wine and drink, and generally restored things to the way they had been. Several of the disciples were hung over, but elixirs of cleansing were offered to them, as was customary.

  Agnesia, Vendrian, Rafael, and the Oathbearers stood just behind them. They spoke with each other—but mostly listened to William’s instructions as they prepared for what was to come, for the ones they were about to face. Wei’s father talked them through what to expect when they re-entered the gala from his place within Wei’s Inventory.

  The young master’s emissions revealed a hallway just beyond the door. At the far end of his perceptive limit lay a new space—a wide open chamber with bodies moving to and fro, and several attendants waiting on standby, surely to welcome him and his sect.

  “I must go,” Ellena said. The former queen was dressed in golden finery and flanked by two knights. However, a coldness leaked from the wound lining her neck, the taint of the Final End seeped into the air. “I must go, lest I lose my mind here. I do not think it is wise for me to fixate on what has happened, on thinking of my battle breath. It comes for everyone. Everyone wins it. Before it arrives, you know this theoretically, but death is… it’s only a story. And then it touches you, and it seizes you, and then it’s not such a story anymore. And all the platitudes and epiphanies and poets and stories you listened to before, they pale before the actual thing. They fail to do it justice.

  “But you have been beyond the edge, haven’t you?” Strength filled her gaze as she looked to Wei, “What did you see there?”

  “I saw my mother.” The words left him raw, and the pain felt as if he had just torn a barbed arrow from his flesh. “She was there. There’s something—something at least. But it only exists in the dark. Within the embrace of the Hound. You… I will do what I can to stop this… to… I have… I might get more powerful.”

  She shook her head. “You’ve done more than anyone can ask of you, boy. You have to think of yourself now.” There was a pause as she shouted, ensuring she made herself clear: “I must make sure that she doesn’t do anything foolish when… I...”

  The queen gestured slightly to herself, as if deciding whether to tell her not to lose hope, to hold to her faith. But he had already failed her once. But… but he couldn’t surrender. Not now. He might not be able to sever the connection between her and the Hound without killing her, but what about the Hound itself.

  Death. Could Wei break the very embodiment of death?

  “An attempt must be made,” the Shell declared. “We would not be true cultivators if we flinch from this righteous task.”

  The young master clenched his fists.

  “No,” he said. “As your patriarch, quartermaster, I command you to fight. I am telling you right now to fight. You are not allowed to die without my say-so. You are not allowed.”

  The queen was taken aback. Her eyes widened, and for a moment, outrage and humor warred on her face. “You order me? That’s what I said. As my riddance, you know I was a queen, right?” The corner of her lip quirked while despair burned behind her eyes.

  “I… I suppose,” he said. “But right now, I am patriarch. And I have demands.”

  She stared at him for a long moment, then snorted. “You are a precious boy, Wei. I’m glad to have known you.”

  He clenched his teeth. “And I do. Now, let’s make sure we continue knowing each other for a while longer.” With a gesture, he waved to the door demons, and at that, the attendants snapped to attention. Their bodies, angular and curved like door handles molded in the form of people, bowed at the waist. Their metallic forms groaned and squealed loudly.

  “We are ready to depart,” Wei announced. At once, the attendants moved, and the mass of the colossal doors swung open as if their weight were comparable to feathers.

  Warmth rushed over Wei—warmth from countless bodies, from distant flames, spices, scents, perfumes, and other mingled flavors. Amid the glow, he also detected something else: an odor of sweat, the stench of offal, the unmistakable stink of bodily waste.

  Such was the allegory of the Claimed Hells: power and splendor masking horror and death. This was the battlegrounds he was about to enter once more.

  “Alright, kid,” Bishop said, materializing the corner of Wei’s vision. “You ready for some politics?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  The Trespasser chuckled. “That’s the spirit. Marking Gold Skull now. Go make some noise.”